Hazardous hike

Mark Baker

Thursday

Mar 18, 2010 at 12:01 AM

They did what they were supposed to do. They didn’t run. They walked slowly. They shouted. Loud and often.

“My whole body was full of adrenaline,” said Julie Butdorf, a University of Oregon student who was hiking Spencer Butte about 6:30 a.m. Wednesday with fellow student and roommate Jenna Rosenfeld when they came upon what they are sure was a cougar a few feet off the trail. And then another. And another.

“There were at least three of them,” Butdorf said.

After making it back to the parking lot at the base of the butte, Butdorf called the Eugene Police Department, which notified Oregon State Police and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. That led wildlife biologist Brian Wolfer of ODFW to post a warning sign at the park’s entrance later Wednesday morning.

“They felt confident that what they saw was a cougar,” said Wolfer, who met Butdorf and Rosenfeld about 9 a.m. and interviewed them, then looked unsuccessfully for tracks. “In that area, I think it’s definitely possible” for cougars to be prowling, Wolfer said.

Cougar sightings in the Spencer Butte area are rare, Wolfer said. Occasionally, though, someone will call and say a cougar ran in front of their car on Fox Hollow Road or Willamette Street, he said.

The city also placed a warning sign on a bulletin board by the entrance to the popular hiking trails, which are part of Spencer Butte Park.

Eugene police in a press release advised people “at this time” to “stay clear of the park.”

It’s unclear just how long people should avoid the area or venture there only if they are prepared to stare down one or more cougars.

Wolfer said Fish and Wildlife will leave its sign up indefinitely. “It’s not necessarily a bad sign to have in place, anyway,” he said. “Lane County has a healthy population of cougars.”

Cougars were almost eliminated by hunters in the mid-1960s, but the state estimates Oregon’s cougar population now at more than 5,700, as management plans and bans on hunting dogs have allowed the felines to flourish. In Lane County, cougar sightings typically take place in remote rural areas, not right at the edge of the Eugene city limits.

Butdorf, 19, and Rosenfeld, 20, were pulling an all-nighter Tuesday, studying for finals, then drove up to the park to hike the butte and see the sunrise, something they’ve done since their days at South Eugene High School.

About 10 minutes into the hike on the main trail, Butdorf said she heard and saw what she thought was a deer about 10 feet from her. She said she shined her head lamp on the animal and caught the cat’s eyes.

“It crouched and growled,” Butdorf said. “So … not a deer. I started to panic, but Jenna calmed me down.”

The young women grew up hiking with their fathers in the McKenzie River Valley. Although they had never seen a cougar in the wild, they knew you are not supposed to run. They held hands and walked backward slowly down the trail. They shouted, “making our voices as deep and loud as possible,” Butdorf said. They heard growls on the other side of the trail, too.

Butdorf got a good look at the first cat, saw its tannish-brown color. The cats stalked them for about five or six minutes, she said.

“They were definitely following us down,” Butdorf said. “Not a great feeling.”

Once they got back into Rosenfeld’s car, Butdorf called her father, who advised calling the police. Eugene police put out a press release, concerned that schoolchildren getting on buses and joggers or hikers needed to be warned, spokeswoman Melinda Kletzok said. “Because we would hate to have anything happen to anybody,” she said.

The warning signs didn’t stop folks from hiking the butte later Wednesday, although most went with caution.

“Where’s the sign?” said Myke Leopold of Marcola. “I need to read it.” Leopold, who’s hiked the butte a half-dozen times, brought along a friend Wednesday, Victoria Aguirre of Medford, who was getting set to hike the 2,065-foot butte for the first time.

Cougars typically hunt in the dark, Wolfer said. It’s rare for cougars to attack humans, he said. And he’s not aware of anyone in Lane County ever being killed by a cougar attack.

Kerry Lennartz, also a UO student, heard about the sighting from a friend Wednesday morning. But that didn’t stop her from taking her weekly walk with her dog, Rozzie, a Shiba Inu. “It’s the middle of the day, so I figured it would be OK,” Lennartz said.

Besides, she’s worked with wildcats at a rescue center in her home state of Indiana, she said. She’s even touched a cougar.

“They’re really sweet in captivity,” Lennartz said. “They purr.”

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